2025 Preview: Only Like a Dragon can get away with such a ridiculous spin-off as Pirate Yakuza
Sega’s Hawaii adventure jumps the shark with gusto
Majima Goro. If any character from the sprawling Like a Dragon series could believably suddenly wake up as a pirate, it’s him.
The Mad Dog of Shimano is the antihero’s antihero, a sadomasochistic lunatic heel turned ally of series protagonist Kazuma Kiryu. He also wears an eye patch. So when Majima awakens with amnesia after washing ashore on an island near Honolulu, fights a group of cutlass-wielding thugs and wins the spot as captain of a galleon, he quickly finds himself Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii’s titular pirate yakuza in Hawaii.
With gameplay set on Honolulu as well as some of its neighboring islands, and with many of 2024 entry Like a Dragon: Infinite Wealth’s minigames reprised, you could argue this spinoff game is a cynical ploy to recycle assets for a quick cash grab.
But when I played a demo of Yakuza Pirate in Hawaii, it very quickly became apparent that throwing Majima into this setting makes for a wildly different experience.
For one thing, there’s combat. Majima’s familiar Mad Dog fighting style is a speed-focused melee style augmented by bonkers special attacks such as a skill that unleashes multiple doppelgangers to even the odds, while Majima can now jump and juggle enemies in mid-air.
Switching to Sea Dog style opens up a whole range of flashy pirate-based abilities, with our batty buccaneer wielding dual cutlasses, which he can thrust as swords or throw like boomerangs, and special moves that unleash a blunderbuss or a rope for swinging into enemies with glee. After the mostly turn-based combat of Infinite Wealth, this taste of Majima action feels kinetic and raw.
Then there’s naval combat, because… pirates? Just like when Black Flag suddenly brought nautical naughtiness to the Assassin’s Creed series, here you can battle on the open sea, boarding rival ships for brawls on deck, and even competing in ship-on-ship Coliseum matches in the illicit pleasure district of pirate haven Madlantis to raise extra cash.
With upgrades including flamethrowers and more, and the option to give your hull a striking leopard skin design, this ain’t your grandpa Long John Silver’s naval combat.
Majima is of course a landlubber at heart, and there’s plenty to do on islands including Madlantis and Honolulu. But while some of these activities are the same as in Infinite Wealth, such as the Crazy Taxi-like minigame Crazy Delivery and Mario Kart clone Dragon Kart, they are greatly enhanced by Majima’s bizarre comments and crude jokes.
Karaoke sessions, meanwhile, are made ever more surreal by his sincere delivery on love songs such as As Long As You’re Happy (a reprise from Yakuza Kiwami 2).
“With upgrades including flamethrowers and more, and the option to give your hull a striking leopard skin design, this ain’t your grandpa Long John Silver’s naval combat.”
Majima is a fan favourite character whose arc has taken him through good times and bad. When we last saw him in Infinite Wealth, he had more or less gone on the straight and narrow, but his concussion here allows him to take a completely different route while allowing his rabid personality to shine through.
It’s an inspired choice that could only work because of the relationship players have built up with Majima over 20 years of games. It will be exciting and no doubt fun to see where Ryu Ga Gotoku Studio takes his story over this game’s 15-ish hours.
As Majima deepens his bonds with Noah, the young boy with a pet tiger cub who rescued him when he washed up on the beach, and faces off against pirate matriarch Queen Michele while building his own pirate gang to become “legends of the sea”, it seems likely Like a Dragon: Pirate Yakuza in Hawaii will be a bold, bonkers and entirely welcome new entry in the Like a Dragon series.
If any game gets a free pass to jump the shark, it’s this one.
